Veteran Ivan Vicelich added to All Whites panel

Former All White Ivan Vicelich is on the four-strong selection panel to pick the next national coach.

The most-capped footballer in New Zealand history, Vicelich retired from international duty in January. He continues to play for Auckland City under Spanish coach Ramon Tribulietx - who has applied for the All Whites job.

Vicelich is also on the board of the NZ Professional Footballers' Association.

The other members of the selection panel are NZ Football chief executive Andy Martin, his high-performance director Fred de Jong and Graeme Robson, a performance planner from High Performance Sport NZ.

The panel has whittled 103 applicants down to a shortlist of six.

"We'll look to bring that down to a shorter list and ultimately get to our preferred candidate," Martin said. "All six will be interviewed to get that list down to two or three and we'll go into a series of more in-depth interviews for the next phase. The coaches are from a broad range of backgrounds. We had a very strong field and we've started conversations with those six people."

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Among the applicants were interim All Whites coach Neil Emblen, former Newcastle Jets coach Gary van Egmond, former Sydney FC coach Frank Farina, All Whites great Wynton Rufer and former Australian Institute of Sport chief Steve O'Connor.

Martin said the new coach would ideally be appointed by the end of the month.

"Obviously with the World Cup certain people are tied up in other things, involved in the World Cup in some shape or form. But we're on track, we're confident we can get there as close to the end of June as possible and we've got some very good candidates."

Emblen coached the side this year to a 4-2 loss to Japan in Tokyo and a 0-0 draw with South Africa in Auckland.

He has the support of captain Glen Moss.

Long-time coach Ricki Herbert fell on his sword last November after the All Whites were beaten 9-3 on aggregate in the World Cup qualifier against Mexico. Fairfax NZ